Shoota's R33 GT-R RB30/26

[Shoota_77]

On 13/09/2022 at 11:26 AM, robbo_rb180 said:

Get some pics up of the tools your making/using be handy for others.

This is going to worth all the effort.

Good idea with the booth/tarps. I've used a 6x3 gazebo & industrial wrap on the sides with good success.

Will do.  The concept is in my head but not sure if it will translate to reality!

 

[Shoota_77]

#prosprayboof

Put my tarps up tonight to create my "spray booth".  It's really bizarre how much it transforms the feel of the shed! 

Obviously I'll either rope or stick each section of the tarps when I'm spraying but make it easier to move around the shed being able move between the sections. The very last tarp I've only attached one end for now and when I'm painting will swing diagonally to the corner of the shed next to the roller door to funnel the air in from that direction and out the other end. 

Still need to have a clean up and move some more stuff around to the other side of the shed but it feels a little more paint ready now! 

 

I've decided I'm replacing the right tow hook panel. As you can see prior to my ownership it's copped a fair whack on a gutter or something to bend it back that far. I smacked it with my heaviest mini sledge hammer and barely budged it!  They're NLA from Nissan in Australia but I think I've found one at Nissan in the US.  Only $160 and about 10 spot welds to drill out and then reweld to replace it. I'd never forgive myself if I did all this work and didn't do it! 

This is what the new panel looks like-

Terrible picture but you get the idea of the size of the panel that needs to be replaced.

Still haven't got the paint yet. Hopefully get to the paint shop before the weekend. I've got an unpainted Skoda bonnet to have a practice squirt on before I fling any paint at my car!. 

[Duncan]

f**k, someone would have felt a bump when that happened!

[r32-25t]

Or it would be from someone using it as a jacking point 

[Duncan]

Maybe.....but I've been lifting my 32, stagea and previously 33 with the front tow points for years, never had the slightest sign of damage. Tow hooks are actually a very convenient spot for low cars because you don't need to get the jack far under the car

[Shoota_77]

On 15/09/2022 at 7:41 AM, Duncan said:

f**k, someone would have felt a bump when that happened!

Yeah for sure. It's incredibly hardened steel so would have bruised coccyx from that hit!

 

On 15/09/2022 at 9:34 AM, r32-25t said:

Or it would be from someone using it as a jacking point 

As above, based on how hard I hit it with the sledgie and not budging it,  jacking it up from that point shouldn't be an issue!

[r32-25t]

On 15/9/2022 at 10:09 AM, Shoota_77 said:

Yeah for sure. It's incredibly hardened steel so would have bruised coccyx from that hit!

 

As above, based on how hard I hit it with the sledgie and not budging it,  jacking it up from that point shouldn't be an issue!

Youd think that then you Jack it from there and the spot welds let go and the panel folds up, there’s a lot of weight on that spot if you Jack it up from there 

[Robzilla32]

On 14/09/2022 at 9:47 PM, Shoota_77 said:

#prosprayboof

Put my tarps up tonight to create my "spray booth".  It's really bizarre how much it transforms the feel of the shed! 

Obviously I'll either rope or stick each section of the tarps when I'm spraying but make it easier to move around the shed being able move between the sections. The very last tarp I've only attached one end for now and when I'm painting will swing diagonally to the corner of the shed next to the roller door to funnel the air in from that direction and out the other end. 

Still need to have a clean up and move some more stuff around to the other side of the shed but it feels a little more paint ready now! 

 

I've decided I'm replacing the right tow hook panel. As you can see prior to my ownership it's copped a fair whack on a gutter or something to bend it back that far. I smacked it with my heaviest mini sledge hammer and barely budged it!  They're NLA from Nissan in Australia but I think I've found one at Nissan in the US.  Only $160 and about 10 spot welds to drill out and then reweld to replace it. I'd never forgive myself if I did all this work and didn't do it! 

This is what the new panel looks like-

Terrible picture but you get the idea of the size of the panel that needs to be replaced.

Still haven't got the paint yet. Hopefully get to the paint shop before the weekend. I've got an unpainted Skoda bonnet to have a practice squirt on before I fling any paint at my car!. 

Fantastic work!

[Shoota_77]

11 hours ago, r32-25t said:

Youd think that then you Jack it from there and the spot welds let go and the panel folds up, there’s a lot of weight on that spot if you Jack it up from there 

I guess the key to this is that there IS a very slight ripple in the panel that the tow point is connected to but given the amount of force require to bend that jacking point, if it did no more than a tiny ripple from that, jacking it up from there is going to be a walk in the park!  In saying that I’ve never used it as a jacking point but I’ll be forever impressed by it’s strength standing up to my sledgie action so won’t have any hesitations in the future! 😂

[Shoota_77]

33 minutes ago, Robzilla32 said:

Fantastic work!

Thanks mate!  Hopefully my high quality, boutique spray “boof” inspires some quality painting! 😂

 

Bought all the paint (epoxy primer, primer filler/surfacer, QM1 base coat, 2K clear and all associated reducers, hardeners, etc today.  Fark that hurt a little…..  About $1000 all up and that is only enough to do about 50% of the car….  After buying everything (spray gun, sandpaper, masking tapes and plastics, the tarps for my spray booth, the paint, etc, etc, etc) it DEFINITELY would have been cheaper to pay someone else to do it but where’s the fun in that?  I’ll still have all of the gear to be able to tackle more painting jobs plus I’m looking forward to gaining some new skills during the painting process. But also dreading the fact that I could completely fark it at the same time!! 😂

Only time will tell I guess!

 

Oh another interesting fact I learnt today.  There are about 5 or 6 DIFFERENT shades of QM1.  Apparently it’s pretty common to have same paint code and multiple different versions.  Shouldn’t that mean it’s a different paint code…..  Bloody dumb if you ask me!  I went with the whitest, cleanest looking version which is straight white with a dash of black in it versus the others which have varying shades of yellow in them.

[Shoota_77]

Very hungover today but determined to crack on when I'd much prefer to suffer in my jocks on the couch and watch YouTube videos of other people moving forwards on their builds but this the new me!  For now....  I'm tipping I'll be back there in a few hours.

Got shipping notification that the new panel has been shipped from the Nissan dealer in the States so removed the old tow point (jacking point......  😏) panel. Came off pretty easily to be honest. I've had a bit of experience drilling out spot welds on my first Datto Ute so remembered some of what I learnt back then (10-12 years ago..).

 

Bit of cleaning up the remnants of the spot weld and she'll be ready to weld the new panel on once it arrives. 

[RBW49N]

On 18/9/2022 at 12:39 PM, Shoota_77 said:

Very hungover today but determined to crack on when I'd much prefer to suffer in my jocks on the couch and watch YouTube videos of other people moving forwards on their builds but this the new me!  For now....  I'm tipping I'll be back there in a few hours.

Got shipping notification that the new panel has been shipped from the Nissan dealer in the States so removed the old tow point (jacking point......  😏) panel. Came off pretty easily to be honest. I've had a bit of experience drilling out spot welds on my first Datto Ute so remembered some of what I learnt back then (10-12 years ago..).

 

Bit of cleaning up the remnants of the spot weld and she'll be ready to weld the new panel on once it arrives. 

Looks good. I noticed the slight rust in the joins are you using any sort of dust treatment before you lock it all in with paint?

[Shoota_77]

1 hour ago, RBW49N said:

Looks good. I noticed the slight rust in the joins are you using any sort of dust treatment before you lock it all in with paint?

I actually caused those surface rust spots you can see when I was cleaning it prior to commencing paint prep.  I used a few harsh degreasers and it was brutal on any bare metal spots.  They rusted instantly.  I've rust treated those spots and any other visible rust.  I'll be seam sealing every single metal join in the car so once that's done and all sealed up with 5-6 layers of paint there won't be any dramas for another 25 years.  If rust is dry when it's coated and has no access to moisture beyond that point, it can't spread any further.

[Shoota_77]

I just don't know when to stop.....

A lot of the purpose behind stripping it right back was caused by my own mistakes about 8 years ago (when the thought of a restoration of sorts was not even a twinkle in my ballsack) when I thought I was helping by spraying around a bit of rattle can paint while the engine was out for the very first time. It no doubt looked better than it did at the time but that paint just didn't stick all that well so fast forward to now I had to scrape heaps of it off with a scraper which was mind numbingly tedious! I then decided I wasn't happy with that so ended up attacking the whole bay with a scotch brite pad on the die grinder before then hand sanding the whole thing again with 60 grit sandpaper.

Apart from welding up a few holes the engine bay is pretty much done and ready for dusting off, wax and greaser wipe down then masking up prior to Epoxy. I'll scuff/sand the wheel arches and underneath tomorrow then it's paint time.  Probably not till next week as I've got my kids basketball tournament all weekend so will be away. Would have smashed out a heap if not for that. 

Right, I'm off to bed...

[Shoota_77]

The scraping, sanding, die grinder pad buzzing goes on and on and on....  I really didn't expect it to take so long!  I reckon I've put 30 hours so far into just the pre-paint prep work.  I'm finally at the point of masking everything up in preparation for the epoxy.  Just need the weather to warm up a bit so I can do it after work one night.  Epoxy doesn't like being sprayed under 15 degrees (apparently!) so need a warm afternoon. 

Because I'm painting all along the sills it makes sense to do the top of  the sill as well rather than masking a line down the middle of it.  Ran into a drama on the drivers side where the striker plate bolts were seized to the body.  Even using an impact driver (proper punch style one, not a rattle gun!) but they would not budge.  Ended up stripping out the head of both screws.  Drilled the centre out of two 12mm ID nuts (to make more room to weld through) and welded them on to the head of the bolts.  Between the heat of welding it stretching the bolt and having two nuts to swing off they came straight out thankfully.  Wasn't looking forward to have to fix the threads if that didn't work...

 

It's been pretty frightening how quickly flash rust sets in when you've sanded back to bare metal.  A few times I've had to sand areas back that have a nice (not nice...) rusty red tinge to them.  I've been SUPER conscious of not touching anything with bare hands while I'm working on it but things are still flash rusting pretty quickly.  Praying for some warmer days late in the week and finally seal everything up.

[Shoota_77]

Still waiting on my tie down point panel from US.  I was hoping it would arrive before I slap the epoxy on this weekend but not looking likely unfortunately.

I've finished the prep and now pretty much finished masking the doors and under the vehicle at the rear where I'm not (currently....) painting.  I'm VERY confident I will do the back while I'm at it but I'll get the front all coated, seam sealed, etc before deciding if I do it now or down the track.  The way I've prepared everything it will be very easy to just do the rear section as a separate job.

I'm putting in a non V-Spec mechanical diff, Hicas lockbar, AN8 fuel hardlines (supply and return) and a Frenchy's in tank fuel setup before it goes back on the road so I definitely need to remove the subframe and fuel tank regardless of whether I paint the arse end or not.  Obviously would be dumb to NOT do it while it's all sitting on the ground but history has told me if I get too balls deep in something that is when I lose interest and get over it.  I refuse to let that happen this time around so playing it safe!

My masking job is as ugly as a 90 year old mans ball sack but as long as it keeps the paint out of where it shouldn't be then it's done its job!

It's quite tricky masking up to an exterior edge where I'm not painting.  I'm using that round soft edge foam tape which hopefully does a nice transition that can't be seen....

 

[Robzilla32]

Well done mate. You are doing the lord's work by restoring this beauty.

[Shoota_77]

1 hour ago, Robzilla32 said:

Well done mate. You are doing the lord's work by restoring this beauty.

Ha ha, cheers mate.  Only time will tell if I do it justice or make it look worse!!

I'm hoping to lay some paint this afternoon if I get the other bits and pieces (door hinges, rad support panel, etc) stripped and ready for paint.  Wish me luck!!!!

[Shoota_77]

Not bad for my first effort. Was absolutely shitting myself just to get started! I was sweating bullets.  Had some teething issues (apart from me being retarded) but got the gun all setup and working nicely. Did a bit of practice spraying and then dove straight in!

A few boo boos and stuff ups but all together pretty bloody happy to have smashed it out!

I'm in Tassie on a dirt bike tour for a week so won't get to touch it for a while so glad I got it all sealed up with the epoxy. 

Another new skill acquired!  Sorry, I'm a bit chuffed at the moment from conquering my fears! 🤣🤣

 

[Robzilla32]

Well done! It is so difficult to jump into something like that